Goodreads to Join the Amazon Family

Well, this is a 'turn up for the books' as they say. According to Goodreads’ website yesterday, they’ve got big news: namely, they’re “joining the Amazon family”.

Today I'm really happy to announce a new milestone for Goodreads: We are joining the Amazon family. We truly could not think of a more perfect partner for Goodreads as we both share a love of books and an appreciation for the authors who write them. We also both love to invent products and services that touch millions of people.

This is a bit of a shock on some levels, but perhaps not surprising on others. It could see integration with the Kindle happen a lot quicker and it’s going to expand the Goodreads platform — much faster than the organic growth they’ve been experiencing over the last six years..

For all of you Kindle readers, there's obviously an extra bonus in this announcement. You've asked us for a long time to be able to integrate your Kindle and Goodreads experiences. Making that option a reality is one of our top priorities.

I can’t say this is a bad move for Goodreads, but is it a good move for their users? I’m not sure everyone will be pleased about this, particularly from the number of Amazon-bashing comments I hear on a regular basis — what they lose in disgruntled users they’ll probably make up for with Amazon devotees. You can’t please everyone, right?

Dean Fetzer is originally from a small town in eastern Colorado, but has lived in London, England, for the past 21 years. After a career in graphic design, he started a pub review website in the late 90’s; He left that in 2011 to concentrate on his thriller writing, as well as offering publishing services for authors, poets and artists. When not writing - or in the pub - he can be found in the theatre, live music venues and travelling.

Impact on ebooks and the publishing world aside, my main concern is amazon messing with how the site works now. I think goodreads is fine the way it is -- there aren't a lot of new features I'm interested in. Don't make any drastic changes, amazon!